Sony

This week the folks at Walmart responsible for listing products at a specific time and date are... probably in trouble. A new model Sony WH-1000XM4 headphones were revealed early by a listing on the Walmart store website, well ahead of official release. This is before Sony acknowledges that they exist, much less that they'll be released soon.

Summer is nearly upon us, which means we're in for video game sales as far as the eye can see. There have already been a handful of PC sales, and there will undoubtedly be more as we make our way through June and July, but today, it's the PlayStation 4's turn. Sony has kicked off its Days of Play sale on the PlayStation Store, marking down a number of games for the next two weeks.

Sony's Xperia phones probably don't come off as a gamer's phone. Its older design seemed aimed more at business users while the newer look is targeted at binge-watchers. Still, every high-end premium phone is technically capable of more resource-intensive gaming and the latest Xperia 1 "Mark II" is no exception. In fact, Sony has stepped up the phone's gaming chops with a new heat suppression feature that offers a rather unique but unconventional way of keeping your phone alive even with long, intense gaming sessions.

Sony just announced that it has delayed its PlayStation 5 games showcase, which was originally slated for Thursday, June 4th. The official PlayStation Twitter account announced the delay this afternoon, citing the protests and riots happening in many regions of the US and saying that it wants to step back to let "important voices be heard."

You'd think that, with all of the uncertainty surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic, there would also be a certain degree of uncertainty regarding this year's big console launches. Both Microsoft and Sony are slated to release new consoles at the end of this year, and despite the pandemic, both companies have stuck to those holiday 2020 release windows with no real delays in sight.

It's no secret that Sony has officially pulled the plug on its last gaming handheld but that was really only as far as production of the PlayStation Vita and its cartridges go. One would expect the console to continue working with existing games though some Vita-related servers to eventually fold. Unfortunately for players of Killzone: Mercenary, that happened without warning even when those official servers were actually run by Sony itself.

On Monday, Sony dropped a teaser revealing one of the games that it will make available to PlayStation Plus subscribers for free in June: Call of Duty: WWII. The company said at the time that it would return in the future to reveal the other titles that will be released in June, and now we finally have those details.

At the dawn of a new hardware generation, console makers are presented an interesting problem: what do you do when a new console launch is essentially fragmenting your userbase? Usually, console makers like Sony and Microsoft will continue supporting previous-generation hardware well into the new generation, but generally, they stop making exclusive games for those platforms. Microsoft, however, plans to do something a little different with the Xbox One and Xbox Series X.

If you're thinking of holding off on buying new PS4 games because the PlayStation 5 is on the horizon, here's a bit of good news: a new report today claims that Sony will begin requiring forward compatibility with PlayStation 4 games this summer. Specifically, the report says that Sony will require PlayStation 5 compatibility in PlayStation 4 games that are certified on or after July 13th.

Earlier this week, we heard a report that claimed Sony would reveal more about the PlayStation 5 in a digital showcase slated for June 4th. It turns out that report was right on the money, as Sony just confirmed a June 4th event that will show off some of the games that will be on the PlayStation 5. The big question now is whether or not we'll see the console itself.

The new HBO Max streaming service finally opened to sign-ups this week, giving consumers yet another major option for watching on-demand TV shows and movies. A day after the service's launch comes a related announcement from Sony: some of its smart TVs now support the service. With this support, owners of these TVs will be able to directly download the app rather than having to use a third-party device.

If you're looking forward to The Last of Us Part II, then you'll definitely want to catch Sony's latest State of Play presentation. Earlier this week, Sony announced a new State of Play that's centered entirely around The Last of Us Part II, even promising that we'll see around 8 minutes of new footage from the game. The State of Play kicks off later today, and here we'll list where you can watch it if you're looking to catch it live.